The present invention relates in general to a scheme and knowledge training system and apparatus to facilitate teaching or training of students to perform certain functions, such as sorting of items in accordance with a predetermined scheme or format and more particularly to a system and apparatus involving audio-visual devices and touch or proximity sensing switching arrays designed to rapidly teach scheme functions such as mail or product sorting and similar distribution skills.
Heretofore, trainees attempting to learn knowledge items such as are required for mail sorting or sorting of other items in accordance with a predetermined scheme have usually had to rely upon a slow process of acquiring small bits of knowledge or skill over an extended period of practice time by use of dummy cards and a practice sorting case or bin structure, or by actually sorting live mail or dummy cards to practice the knowledge and skill of sorting over a long period of time by a slow learning process. Extensive reading, home study and work at a simulated sortation position permits one to acquire improved sorting skills, but with a very slow process. No means of providing automated audio-visual scheme training systems to provide trainees with a sorting learning experience which would rapidly teach the necessary knowledge items and training skills has been provided, to our knowledge.
The present invention involves a simulated electronic sortation console and an audio-visual projector system, interrelated with each other to provide certain predetermined training and testing modes of use in connection with a structured series of program lessons designed to rapidly teach trainees to acquire sortation knowledge and sufficient sortation skill to rapidly reach the standards of qualifications necessary for live mail sorting employment and the like. This knowledge can be employed in mail sortation by manual or machine methods. The system is designed to greatly reduce training time, offers superior training to lead to more highly skilled employees capable of greater sorting accuracy, while providing considerable program flexibility to permit change and scheme updating and the like. A factor of accuracy reinforcement is present in the system by circuitry which, in the training mode, prevents the trainee from advancing from one sort to the next unless the previous letter or item to be sorted was sorted at the correct position, thereby preventing the learner from having to relearn sorting knowledge or skill which involved mis-sorts which the trainee thought was correct, but were in fact erroneous. The system also includes means providing a testing mode, wherein a supervisor may condition the system to have the trainee go through a lesson and counting devices record and indicate the number of correct sorts and incorrect sorts made.
More particularly, the system of the present invention includes an electronic sortation console which gives the appearance of a scheme base, to simulate a mail sorting case having a large number of pigeon holes into which letters or mail are to be sorted, providing a gridwork of sort locations having means for displaying changeable indicia indicating addresses or the like and adjacent switches at each of the sort positions adjacent the associated indicia, to respond to touch contact or proximity of the finger. An audio-visual projector is designed to provide a visual image of mail, maps, addresses or whatever stimulus is needed for the specific training requirements of the trainee, and the trainee is intended to activate the correctly located sort switch adjacent the indicia on the sortation console corresponding to the visual information provided on the projector screen. Electrical connections between the projector and the console are such that if the trainee activates the correctly located sort switch, a new visual image of an address or the like will automatically appear on the projector screen, but if the sort is in error, a warning signal will appear indicating to the trainee where the correctly located sort should have occurred, and the trainee must correct the input by contacting the correct sort switch before proceeding to the next image on the projector screen. Correctly located sorts and incorrect sorts are continuously being recorded on counters providing a continual indication of the number of correct and incorrect sorts which have been made during performing of the lesson. The learner sees one address or piece of mail at a time on the visual screen jet as if the learner were holding a stack of mail, and the learner is prevented from unknowingly making mis-sorts or incorrect sorts because of the warning signal feature which appears when a mis-sort is made and because the letter image on the visual screen is held on the screen until the correct response is made. Thus, only correct answers or sorts advance the training program displayed on the projector screen.
By the present system, the trainee's memory learning process is first aided by introducing material in small bits and allowing the trainee to respond. Only correct responses allow the trainee to advance the program. The student never learns incorrectly. As the trainee responds to a projected address or information displayed on the visual screen, only the correct sortation will permit the program to advance. Additionally, the trainee is immediately shown the correct response, providing positive reinforcement, by a warning signal in the form of light appearing at the correct sort position.
An object of the present invention, therefore, is the provision of a novel scheme and knowledge trainer system and apparatus designed to facilitate highly skilled scheme and knowledge training in accordance with sortation schemes, such as mail sorting, and the like, wherein the material is displayed on a visual screen of an audio-visual projector and an electronic sortation console having replaceable indicia such as addresses, maps, names of locations, or similar information, is activated by the trainee touching a position on the console, activating a switch which is identified by electronic circuitry as either the correct or the incorrect sort position for the information on the projector screen, and wherein device maintains a readout count of correct and incorrect sorts by the trainee.
Another object of the present invention is the provision of a novel scheme and knowledge training system and apparatus as defined in the immediately preceding paragraph, wherein the system may be conditioned to effect automatic advancing of the program or lesson information on the visual screen if the correct sort location is touched by the trainee and which provides a visible warning signal indicating where the correct sort location is in the event an incorrect sort location is touched, and wherein the lesson information does not advance to the next item until the correct sort location is touched.
Other objects, advantages and capabilities of the present invention will become apparent from the following detailed description, taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings illustrating a preferred embodiment of the invention.